OK Pontiac Aficionados, what is it?

[Oracle of Delphi]

And no it's not a Banshee ... Hit the link and then scroll up ...

Link: http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/2009/01...nshee/#comments

[wildcat]

Was there some concept called the Mako Shark? It's been many years and I could be very wrong

[Satty]

Balthy probably knows exactly what it is, has 6 books about it, and ate lunch yesterday with the original owner.

[ocnblu]

wildcat, yeah, but the Mako Sharks were Corvettes.

[hyperv6]

I have seen or read about every Pontiac show car ever made and this is one I have never seen or heard of.

I suspect it was a one off car that someonw built on their own. While it has Pontiac parts if GM had done this it more than not would have had a GM not a VW front suspension. [Though there was sever Vette prototypes that did use some Porsche and Benz bits.

It is good copy of one of the Alfa B.A.T.

Back in the 50's-60's there were a lot of people in Europe and California well capable of hammering a bodyu out like this. This was not as rare of a skill as it is today. So getting a body made like this is not an issue. Dean Jeffries Hamered out and built his Aluminm Mantaray show car in only a month.

I note there is a little Benz 300 cue in the exhaust too.

[Croc]

Balthy probably knows exactly what it is, has 6 books about it, and ate lunch yesterday with the original owner.

SO f@#kING TRUE!!!

[ocnblu]

*waiting for balthy to see thread*

[balthazar]

Hello all. I should miss an evening on C&G more often... if stuff like this will show up in my absence.

Interesting. I was initially thinking of the '61 Scorpian, XP-758, but that was a 'torpedo'-back job without fins, and this is NOT a modifed version of that- that car was fiberglas.

Tho there were 6 cars built under the XP-833 Banshee programs (all the online pics of the 2 existing cars are of #5 and #6)... none of the specs of the 1st 4 cars match this one (tube frame & V-8 ).

It's also far too cobbled together to be a PMD job.

No other period PMD concepts/projects come to mind.

At this point I tend to agree with the article- it's a home-built job. Nice bodywork tho!

Edited March 15, 2009 by balthazar

[hyperv6]

Hello all. I should miss an evening on C&G more often... if stuff like this will show up in my absence.

Interesting. I was initially thinking of the '61 Scorpian, XP-758, but that was a 'torpedo'-back job without fins, and this is NOT a modifed version of that- that car was fiberglas.

Tho there were 6 cars built under the XP-833 Banshee programs (all the online pics of the 2 existing cars are of #5 and #6)... none of the specs of the 1st 4 cars match this one (tube frame & V-8 ).

It's also far too cobbled together to be a PMD job.

No other period PMD concepts/projects come to mind.

At this point I tend to agree with the article- it's a home-built job. Nice bodywork tho!

One look at the dash would tell is enough to tell it is not GM.

[balthazar]

To tell the truth, nothing about it other than the 8-lugs & powertrain (plus the steering wheel) say 'GM" to my eye... and those components alone only point to an individual's parts scrounging.

Like I said- it's FAR too crude to be a Corp piece.

It IS, however, rather ambitious bodywise, for a homebuilt... but like you said- this skill used to be far more available than now.

[ocnblu]

Could it be a TV or movie car?

[Intrepidation]

Balthy probably knows exactly what it is, has 6 books about it, and ate lunch yesterday with the original owner.

[balthazar]

I wish I had more contact with those in the industry. I was in Detroit in the '80s for a year, if I had been as into history then as I am now, I certainly would've looked up some of the addresses of the birthplaces of auto history.

Who here in Detroit can tell me what's at the corner of 1343 Cass Avenue today ? FOG- take a pic.

Sh!t- that was only a short walk from where I was...

I used to haunt the automotive library of the Detroit Public Library- pulling random auto folders from the archives via the reference desk and paging thru them. As I sat every few evenings or so, I tended to share the table with an elderly guy who was always reading huge bound copies of turn-of the century publications. Somehow, after warily eyeballing each other from opposite ends of our respective timelines, we began to converse. I think he was suitably shocked to learn we could have a historical automotive conversation. We became pretty good friends for that brief year- I was an automotive design student, and he was an automotive historian & author, and ex-ChryCo stylist. I took his thru the studios of the school to view student's work, that & our conversations actually sparked him to take up the pencil and draw a few more. He ended up giving me signed copies of his books, which sit, honored, in my library, along with those drawings.

I knew he was only a tip of a history iceberg there in Detroit- but I had little time or mobility. I wish it had been otherwise...